Denghuaxiao

Chapter 253: (Feng Shu) Leaves Falling in the Wind (Part )
The golden wind blows gently, and the leaves of the paulownia trees fall.

As soon as autumn arrived in Shengjing, there would be sudden rains at night. After one night, the leaves of the sycamore trees in the palace were all over the ground.

Duan Xiaoyan got up early to feed Gardenia. Just as he swept away the fallen leaves, a gust of wind came and knocked down half of the sycamore trees.

Xiao Zhufeng had just arrived at the Palace Marshal's Mansion and had not yet entered the door when a leaf fluttered down from above his head and landed on his shoulder.

He stopped and reached out to take the fallen leaves off his shoulders.

It is a complete sycamore leaf, the green color has turned into a beautiful golden yellow, showing a bright warmth in the autumn morning.

He walked in with the fallen leaves.

In the palace commander's residence, several guards were gathered together chatting and eating breakfast. When they saw him coming, they quickly fell silent and moved away, their expressions becoming serious.

Unlike Pei Yunying, no matter what he did in private, Pei Yunying always loved to laugh and make jokes, and was liked by everyone. The guards in the Palace Marshal's Mansion loved to talk to Pei Yunying. But he was different. He was always cold and taciturn, and the guards looked at him with some fear.

He is used to it.

When he returned to the house, he found that there were rarely no piles of official documents on the desk. The "Autumn Hunt" was approaching, and Pei Yunying was busy in the martial arts field all day long, but he had some free time - during the six months when Pei Yunying went to southern Jiangsu, he handled all the affairs of the Palace Front Department.

He would not look for trouble when he had free time. After all, Pei Yunying had just gotten married and had too much free time, which would always make those who were alone in the sea of ​​love jealous.

Xiao Zhufeng sat down in front of the window, picked up a collection of poems from the corner of the table, and put the golden fallen leaves he had just picked up into the book.

There are already many fallen leaves stuck between the pages of the book, making the already thick collection of poems even heavier, as if it contains many autumn secrets.

Duan Xiaoyan had accidentally flipped through this collection of poems and was shocked to see the dead leaves mixed in. He couldn't help but ask him, "Brother, what is your habit of putting so many leaves in the book?"

The literati and scholars in Shengjing might have behaved in such an elegant manner, but he was just a warrior, not an elegant guest, so this behavior was somewhat inappropriate.

Xiao Zhufeng turned his head and looked out the window.

There is no one in the deep courtyard, the parasol trees have withered early, and the empty branches outside are rustling in the west wind.

He likes to collect fallen leaves.

Because he once received a fallen leaf.

A fallen leaf filled with a girl's thoughts and beautiful handwriting.

……

Xiao Zhufeng is an orphan.

A woman found him by the river while washing clothes. He was wrapped in rags and had no tokens left. The woman sent him to the Salesian's Office, where he grew up.

The Charity Bureau adopted all the abandoned orphans in Shengjing. When these children reached a certain age, they would leave the Charity Bureau to make a living on their own, or if they were lucky, be adopted by someone else. He grew up in the Charity Bureau until he was five years old, and he didn't even have a name.

One day, a man came to the orphanage to pick people. The man had a hideous scar at the corner of his eye, and his eyes were sharp and sinister like an eagle. When his eyes swept across the orphans in the orphanage, the children were frightened by the fierce look, but he did not avoid or hide, but looked back silently.

The man was a little surprised, then he pointed his finger, gave the Charity Bureau ten taels of silver, and took him away.

After returning, the man asked him his name and he shook his head.

The orphans in the Salesian's Office are called by their names if they remember their names, but he has not known his parents since he was born, so he does not know his own name.

The other party looked at him for a long time, then said in a cold voice: "Xiao Xiao's tears fall alone, and the fallen leaves follow the wind. Since you don't have a name, from now on you will be called Xiao Zhufeng."

Xiao Zhufeng.

He liked this name, which gave him a feeling of the autumn grass dying and leaves falling in sorrow.

The person who took him away was called Yan Xu, who later became his teacher.

Yan Xu taught him how to read and write, and also taught him martial arts. Yan Xu worked in the Privy Council, but he was also investigating old cases in private. He adopted a group of orphans, who worked for Yan Xu and had no worries. Even if they died, no one cared, just like withered autumn grass.

Xiao Zhufeng is the most outstanding among the orphans under Yan Xu.

He doesn't like to talk, always stays silent, and when he gets angry, he is more reckless than anyone else. Such a person is most suitable to be a death warrior. When he was twelve years old, he could go on missions alone, and Yan Xu cultivated him as his confidant.

When Xiao Zhufeng was sixteen years old, he received a mission.

This mission is different from the previous ones. It does not require killing or taking risks. The mission is to go to Zhaoning Mansion to protect someone.

That person's name is Pei Yunshu.

Later, Xiao Zhufeng learned that his teacher Yan Xu had a sweetheart when he was young, but the sweetheart later married someone else and died young. Only a pair of children were left. The son left Shengjing for a distant place not long ago. Yan Xu asked him to disguise himself and enter the Zhaoning Mansion to secretly protect the daughter of the lady, Miss Pei Yunshu of the Pei Mansion.

Xiao Zhufeng then entered Pei Mansion.

He disguised himself and put on an ordinary face that people would never remember after seeing it once. After spending a lot of effort, he finally became a guard in Pei Yunshu's yard.

He met Pei Yunshu.

The eighteen-year-old Pei Yunshu was raised in a secluded place. She looked like all the other daughters of wealthy families: boring, dull, and gentle. If there was anything special about her, it was that she had a good temper. She never treated her servants harshly, and even when she was bullied, she would never talk back.

Pei Yunshu's life in Zhaoning Mansion was not good.

Even though she was the legitimate daughter of the Pei family, Pei Di married a new wife a year after the death of Lady Zhaoning. The mistress Jiang Wan was kind but heartbroken, and the concubine Mei was not an easy person to deal with either. Pei Di was even colder and more heartless. Although Pei Yunshu had enough food and clothing in the Pei Mansion, her situation was very difficult.

Xiao Zhufeng grew up in the Charity Bureau and later followed Yan Xu. He was better at reading people's expressions than others. Seeing Pei Yunshu living such a life in the Pei Mansion, he felt deeply moved.

I used to think that a daughter of a wealthy family wouldn't have to depend on others for support, but it turns out that difficulties will always exist no matter when or where.

However, Pei Yunshu herself was quite insightful.

Except for worrying about her brother, she was calm and composed most of the time. She pretended not to hear Jiang Wan's hidden thorns, and she was able to deal with the concubines' provocations. She even saw her biological father's coldness and indifference, but she didn't take it to heart.

She lives very seriously and hard, as if she is waiting for someone to come back and not to hold the other person back, so she tries her best to do the best within her ability.

Once, Aunt Mei and the nanny in the new mistress's courtyard were arguing about something unknown. Pei Yunshu passed by. During the argument, the boiling sweet soup in the food basket was about to be poured on Pei Yunshu's face. Xiao Zhufeng flew forward and blocked the boiling soup for Pei Yunshu.

His purpose of coming to Pei Mansion was to secretly protect Pei Yunshu.

Later, Pei Di's people came and resolved the matter. Xiao Zhufeng returned to the yard and continued to guard the gate. Unexpectedly, someone came to find him in the evening. "I've been looking for you for a long time." Pei Yunshu said, "Finally found you."

Xiao Zhufeng was startled and almost touched his face subconsciously, thinking that the human skin mask was exposed.

"Aren't you injured?" The woman reached out and stuffed a bottle of medicine into his hand. "I saw everything just now. The soup was very hot. I'm afraid your arm is injured. It must be very painful and may leave a scar. This medicine is very useful. Remember to apply it."

"Thank you so much just now."

She smiled, nodded, thanked him, and walked away with her skirt lifted.

Xiao Zhufeng looked at the medicine bottle in his hand and pursed his lips.

He had been hurt many times before, so that little burn was nothing. In the past, when he was hurt, no one would come to ask about his concern, let alone care whether it hurt or not. The teacher always told them to be strong, and those who were afraid of pain could not move forward.

Only girls who are raised in seclusion would care about whether or not to leave scars.

He sneered in his heart, but perhaps this was the first time someone gave him medicine for his injuries, so he kept it.

Pei Yunshu is eighteen years old. Some young ladies of this age in Shengjing have already started discussing marriage.

I heard that Pei Di has also started to choose a suitable family for Pei Yunshu.

The leaves of the sycamore trees in the yard turned yellow, and Pei Yunshu asked her maid to pick up a lot of them. She wrote on them in imitation of scholars, and then scattered them against the small building. She then grabbed her skirt and went down to pick them up.

One day a leaf was missing and I couldn't find it no matter how hard I looked. Then I thought that since there was no signature on it, I just gave up.

Later, when Xiao Zhufeng was walking through the courtyard at night, he found the leaf high on the courtyard wall. It must have been the leaf that Pei Yunshu accidentally dropped on the courtyard wall and was blocked by it.

He lowered his head and saw lines of beautiful small characters written on the leaves of the Chinese parasol tree:

I wiped my eyebrows with my green eyes, thinking of the things in my heart. I took up my pen and went to the courtyard to write down the words of longing...

This word is not written on stone, this word is not written on paper. Write it on the autumn leaves, and let it rise with the autumn wind...

The world's caring people, all understand the love of death. The world's unfaithful people, do not know the meaning of love...

With a heart and without a heart, I don't know where it will end...

He was not familiar with poetry, so he searched through the classics and found out that this allusion came from a minister in the previous dynasty. When he was leaning against the wall in the temple, a tung leaf suddenly fell into his arms. He picked it up and saw that this poem was written on it. The minister kept the leaf and married many years later. It turned out that his wife was the one who wrote the poem.

Perhaps Pei Yunshu wrote this on the tung leaf intentionally because she was thinking about her marriage and the future.

He should have thrown away the leaf, but for some reason, he picked it up and put it between his books.

The Privy Council had a new task, so he had to go on a long journey. The Pei family's mission was given to another person. He left at night in a hurry, without even having time to look at the other person. When he returned to Shengjing, Pei Yunshu had already married.

She married into the Prince Wen's Mansion.

Xiao Zhufeng, who was always silent about everything, asked Yan Xu a question that was not related to the mission for the first time. He asked: "Why didn't the teacher stop it?"

Everyone in Shengjing knows what kind of person Prince Wen Mu Sheng is. It would not be a good ending for Pei Yunshu to marry such a man.

"How do you know I didn't stop you?" Yan Xu replied coldly, the scar at the corner of his eye glaring in the firelight.

It turned out that at the beginning, Pei Di wanted Pei Yunshu to enter the palace.

Pei Yunying also knew about this, so he tried his best to find the evidence left by the mother's family of Princess Zhaoning in an attempt to make a deal with Pei Di.

But I don't know what Pei Di said to Pei Yunshu. In fact, if you think about it, you will know that the only one who can threaten Pei Yunshu is Pei Yunying. In short, Pei Yunshu accepted the arrangement and she did not enter the palace. Perhaps Pei Di also considered that the enraged Pei Yunying might do something that would hurt both sides, so he finally compromised and married Pei Yunshu into the Prince of Wen's Mansion.

And just like that, she got married.

The woman who once had expectations for love and wrote on a paulownia leaf, "All the loving people in the world will understand the pain of lovesickness. The unfaithful people in the world do not know the meaning of lovesickness. I don't know where the loving and the unfaithful will end up" married a mediocre prince.

When Xiao Zhufeng opened the poetry collection and saw the tung leaf sandwiched between the two, he felt suffocated.

Pei Yunying returned to Shengjing, and the two of them went from disliking each other to reluctantly cooperating, and then becoming partners who relied on each other. He always asked Pei Yunying indirectly about Pei Yunshu's recent situation, whether she had lost weight, was sick, and whether she had been wronged in Wenjun Prince's Mansion.

Pei Yunying is a shrewd man, well versed in the ways of the world, and he can easily find out the clues from the traces, not to mention that he is not very good at hiding.

"You like my sister?"

"No."

"Didn't you go all the way to buy lychees for her?"

"On the way."

"Xiao Er, why didn't you take action earlier?"

He was silent.

He actually didn't fall in love with Pei Yunshu during the days in Zhaoning Mansion. Even though he saw her every day at that time, he only thought of her as a person he was supposed to protect.

On the contrary, after she got married, she was always worried and uneasy, and she fell deeper and deeper into the relationship. She just realized that this was because she was in love.

The person he liked was already married, so he could only protect and watch over her secretly, just like he did in the Zhaoning Mansion.

Pei Yunying always asked him why he didn't express his feelings to Pei Yunshu since they had divorced. He always remained silent and avoided talking about this issue.

Born with a silver spoon in his mouth, the favored child of heaven had no idea what the Charity Bureau was. He had no parents or relatives. If he followed Yan Xu, he might die under the enemy's hidden arrows one day. How could a person who was not sure of his own future give others a future?

Do not indulge in selfish desires for your own selfish ends.

The autumn wind outside the window blew, making the window rustle slightly. A guard came in from outside and said, "Deputy Envoy, the new soldiers' register has been delivered. The master wants you to go to the martial arts arena."

He put down the collection of poems, put it back into the drawer, got up and left the room.

It was autumn, and the streets of Shengjing were crowded with people. He did not ride a horse, but walked along the street. When he reached an alley, he suddenly heard a familiar voice.

"Mu Sheng, don't go too far!"

Xiao Zhufeng stopped and looked suddenly into the alley.